Do you think Classic TBC or Retail WoW will be more popular for the coming year?

[Le Conceptuel]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion, from our ever-stilted and distorted perception of reality, expect that this may impact Classic Burning Crusade servers positively? Although I expect Retail WoW to have the healthier lifespan overall, I do wonder if TBC will be more popular, at least compared to Classic WoW, for the coming year with a possible lengthy content drought on the horizon?

[Squigglyo]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2

Random players in Trade Chat and low-tier streamers dont count as well-grounded sources

[T-34]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion, from our ever-stilted and distorted perception of reality, expect that this may impact Classic Burning Crusade servers positively? Although I expect Retail WoW to have the healthier lifespan overall, I do wonder if TBC will be more popular, at least compared to Classic WoW, for the coming year with a possible lengthy content drought on the horizon?

Your poll is based on the assumption that Retail and Classic(TBC) are competing for the same players: "If Retail gets less popular TBC Classic migth get more players".
Why do you assume that this is the case?

[Yuli]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion, from our ever-stilted and distorted perception of reality, expect that this may impact Classic Burning Crusade servers positively? Although I expect Retail WoW to have the healthier lifespan overall, I do wonder if TBC will be more popular, at least compared to Classic WoW, for the coming year with a possible lengthy content drought on the horizon?

well-grounded rumors hahahahahahaha

[Nyel]

TBC, undoubtly. Shadowlands with the very late 9.1 patch has lost a massive amount of players already, while TBC will see a massive surge in subs again. Without TBC coming soon it would be a financially disastrous year for Blizzard due to the very slow development regarding retail.

All 2021 has to offer for retail is 9.1. 9.2 is not coming out this year, so 9.1 is all to keep retail players entertained - TBC has the leveling experience, the launch raids and maybe one or two phases on top of that this year alone - it’s obvious what will be more popular.

It might change next year, but I don’t see it as Shadowlands content is sparse and Shadowlands in general isn’t a well-received expansion. And the longer it takes Blizzard to deliver retail content, the worse it gets.

- - - Updated - - -

Your poll is based on the assumption that Retail and Classic(TBC) are competing for the same players: "If Retail gets less popular TBC Classic migth get more players".
Why do you assume that this is the case?

It‘s not the same playerbase entirely, but it for sure overlaps.

[Razion]

I expect TBC Classic to be bigger than Vanilla Classic was. I expect Wrath Classic to be bigger than TBC Classic. I don't expect TBC Classic to be bigger than SL-Retail initially, but rather at the end of SL-Retail when everyone has gotten end of expac blues.

[T-34]

It‘s not the same playerbase entirely, but it for sure overlaps.

There is for sure some overlap, but how will you measure that some players have stopped playing Retail and have gone over to Classic?
We don't have access to that data, only Blizzard does.

We also have a part (how big is unknown) that has one game as the primary and the other as the secondary. I for one have Retail as my main game and have only dabbled in Classic. If Retail wouldn't be fun for me anymore I would stop altogether. But some might replace their main game with the secondary. How many? Only Blizzard knows.

This poll is based on the assumption that Retail and Classic are exclusive - you play either/or - and that if one is bad you can replace it with the other.

While I have no doubt that TBC Classic will be a huge success just as Classic Vanilla, but to correlate the success of Classic TBC with the state of Retail seems quite questionable to me and furthermore it will be impossible for us to validate/falsify this assumption.

[crusadernero]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion, from our ever-stilted and distorted perception of reality, expect that this may impact Classic Burning Crusade servers positively? Although I expect Retail WoW to have the healthier lifespan overall, I do wonder if TBC will be more popular, at least compared to Classic WoW, for the coming year with a possible lengthy content drought on the horizon?

9.1 better be some awesome patch, i'll say that. So far it looks like im going to sub up when the raid is out on lfr, clear it and do whatever quests thats new for story. Except that it looks like most of it will be long ass grinds for legendaries, thats about it.

[Zantera]

Don't really see much difference from Classic to Classic TBC. You have a mix of the nostalgia seekers and people who didn't play TBC who will go there, you will have people like myself who played through TBC, had fun, but would rather move forward who will stick to retail.

Like someone else pointed out they aren't necessarily competing for the same players either.

[crusadernero]

There is for sure some overlap, but how will you measure that some players have stopped playing Retail and have gone over to Classic?
We don't have access to that data, only Blizzard does.

We also have a part (how big is unknown) that has one game as the primary and the other as the secondary. I for one have Retail as my main game and have only dabbled in Classic. If Retail wouldn't be fun for me anymore I would stop altogether. But some might replace their main game with the secondary. How many? Only Blizzard knows.

This poll is based on the assumption that Retail and Classic are exclusive - you play either/or - and that if one is bad you can replace it with the other.

While I have no doubt that TBC Classic will be a huge success just as Classic Vanilla, but to correlate the success of Classic TBC with the state of Retail seems quite questionable to me and furthermore it will be impossible for us to validate/falsify this assumption.

I have been one of those that change over to classic when retail was boring. I kept doing that for quite a while. Realised i'll rather just unsub, cause at this point all im doing is "grinding" stuff i've done before. I played vanilla back in the day, I played BC back in the day. So all im doing right now is replaying the old version(s) of wow, while replaying content at max level on retail.

No more. They only thing that will keep me subbed over longer periods of time now will be whatever retail brings. By the looks of it, it wont be long lasting subs. I dont think Blizzard cares either way if most people do like me, they make enough money as it is from other venues in the game than just a sub.

What kept me going for a while in classic was that I played with a friend. He eventually got bored(me too) and we decided to call it quits.

After over 15 years with this game, im done and tierd of doing same content over and over and over again.

- - - Updated - - -

Don't really see much difference from Classic to Classic TBC. You have a mix of the nostalgia seekers and people who didn't play TBC who will go there, you will have people like myself who played through TBC, had fun, but would rather move forward who will stick to retail.

Like someone else pointed out they aren't necessarily competing for the same players either.

I think theres people that do play both versions, but its hard to commit enough time for both. Especially classic/BC dictates you should spend alot of hours to get anything out of it - if you want to raid and all that at a decent level.

I treated classic very casually. I have only been leveling out in the world for the most part, few dungeons here and there. Havent reached max level, it was more of a nostalgia trip if anything.

[Kaver]

Random players in Trade Chat and low-tier streamers dont count as well-grounded sources

Well it's pretty safe to say that either we wont get 9.3 or Shadowlands is going to last for 3 years. By the time we get 9.1 we already had 7.2 in Legion.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

My guess is it probably will bounce around between the two. When TBC releases it will jump on top. Retail drops a patch it will spike. TBC phase drops it spikes. Retail drops another patch it spikes. Repeat and repeat.. the only thing I can see that MIGHT give TBC an advantage is that it probably won't take 8 months between phases because the work is done.. will just boil down to putting the content out on the server. With retail and how things are going who knows.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion

Are these just like the "well-grounded rumors" of no 8.3?

[Accendor]

TBC is alteady dead on arrival thanks to character boosts and microtransactions (store mount), so my guess is on retail

[Ohvul]

I anticipate within the next 5 years / 2 expansion announcements that wow becomes more about uptime downtime cycles. Join during the beginning of a content patch, play it for 2 to 3 months and then on avg leave if you don't enjoy the repetiiveness while you wait 3 to 4 for the next patch. Players requiring something new and engaging to do every day of every year is a completely backwards philosophy in this game, thats only been capable thus far / in the past because repetitive content feels less repetitive while it is still conceptually new to the game. Wows finding its stride in creating repetitive pve content (torghast and mythic plus) and will only be refined further in the next 5 years.

As for the immediate future, I think BC will see a surge simply because i see more people giving it a try when they get bored with retail, much more so than the people getting bored with bc doing the opposite and trying retail, I think the majority group preferring BC has a fairly stable stance as to what sort of gameplay / balance they want in the game. They also know exactly what they are getting into.

Shadowlands is perfectly fine for myself in regards to what I want out of a video game. I haven't logged in aside from leveling alts in the past couple months, I've done everything I want to, and I'll be back shortly before 9.1 to catchup my renown in my maxed characters. The play every day mantra isn't my tune anymore and I expect it to be the case with many others / those preferring to just raid logging. Longer periods of downtime between patches just means a month or two where my playtime significantly drops... I love that. Many don't, but I honestly don't think blizz has ever cared about the people complaining about having nothing new and exciting to do during content droughts. Its completely optional to play everyday and if the devs could flip a switch and miraculously produce solid content at a quicker profitable pace... they would. Now they have another two copies of the game to eat up players time when they're bored of retail waiting for new content.

[Gaidax]

People will blast through Classic TBC like they did through Classic and that's it. It will be big hype for several months and then only fraction will stay there, just as it was with Classic.

[mojusk]

just like classic wow and retail, it will have huge hype for a month, then settle down untill the next patch, then hype again though not as huge.
thats just how wow works now that there are so many alternative games to play.
the game that just releases new content will be the most popular. on average i still think retail will pull ahead.

[deenman]

the chances of tbc being more popular is literaly zero,vanila classic didnt do it...and as we know for a fact from private server's,classic absolutely demolished tbc's numbers

ofc im sure big patches like sunwell will likely have more players than SL in its down period

[Azerate]

TBC Classic will probably be a bit more successful than Classic, but that's no big achievement as that game died after like 1 month.

Will it be more successful than SL depends on 9.1 and how fast we get 9.2 later.

Also - don't spread fake rumors please. At this point mods should step in and do something about this. That's how bullshit spreads.

[Lochton]

Due to unfortunately(?) well-grounded rumors starting to circulate that Shadowlands will be cut short at 9.2, what does the population of MMO-Champion, from our ever-stilted and distorted perception of reality, expect that this may impact Classic Burning Crusade servers positively? Although I expect Retail WoW to have the healthier lifespan overall, I do wonder if TBC will be more popular, at least compared to Classic WoW, for the coming year with a possible lengthy content drought on the horizon?

First of all, I think this is a category of a game vs. game? Feels like it.

Secondly, go with the flow. TBC Classic will have a surge of players by its release because it is the new hype, meanwhile, Progression servers will be a little behind due to currently people feeling it stale and the unknown of the next patch - and for some, next exp

Third and last, rumors are just rumors. There is no proof, nor any valid sources documented. My own belief is that Shadowlands as an area will be cut short in 9.x as the heroes return to Azeroth before the pre-patch happenings to conclude a patch.